Good grief. We Baby Boomers are an evil lot.

We have secretly turned the future of Millennials and Generation-Alphabets to chopped liver by refusing to quit our jobs and move out of our homes. That according to dozens of newspaper, magazine and blog posts I’ve seen.

And before we messed up our grandkids we screwed up their parents.

That according to Family Ties reruns.

It seems only fair that if we are going to mess with Millennials and Generation-Alphabets again, we should give them a heads up.

Okay, everyone, heads up.

If and when we decide to move out of our old jobs, we’re moving into new ones. And, not just any new ones. We’re doing young peoples’ work, work we’d gladly have you do if you weren’t busy posting to social media from your old bedrooms, where you live rent free.

I’m surprised you haven’t noticed the changes. They’re right before your eyes, on those screens you stare at all day long.

Perhaps no one gets the brunt of aging more than actors who are so much on public display. So who better to ask about the crumbling of the youth culture than those who work in an industry where your outsides are more important than your insides?

“I think that energy is what makes you appealing, no matter how old you are,” said Baby Boomer actor Marcie Barkin, a transplanted Brooklynite who came to Los Angeles when she was nine years old and soon became a native.

Barkin and her fellow Baby Boomer acting partner, Amanda Serra, are the co-stars and co-conspirators of Carbon Dating, a web comedy series about two single, middle-aged best friends who are awkwardly aging in a youth-oriented society. (Michael Gross—yes, that Michael Gross—also has a lead role and producing credit on the show.) Serra, also the show’s writer and creator, hails from the Midwest and has a plain-spoken delivery that contrasts nicely with with Barkin’s flair for East Coast dramatics.

“Things have changed,” Serra said. “For example, Maggie Smith is revered and she has let herself age naturally. Judy Dench? The same thing. Helen Mirren has admitted to a few nips and tucks, but the point is women can take a leaf out of their notebook because it’s on the Internet and social media. It’s okay to age into your role in life, despite Hollywood’s attempts to push youth and beauty instead of talent and experience.”

What interested me most about the pair was their shared attitudes about youth, entertainment and their futures. Like most Baby Boomers, they had no desire to pull into the slow lane, despite the incessant honking of the generations behind them. If anything, Amanda and Marcie are representative of many of us who are not ready to trade wisdom and experience for planned obsolescence.

“I think we have an opportunity to look like we look and get a fan base that’s based on the heart. Everybody can smile at our stories because we’re all getting there,” Barkin said.

The show is prepping for its second season, with more story lines modeled after their own lives. Their inspiration for creating a show, however, came from pioneering women in entertainment such as Susan Sarandon, Jody Foster, Tina Fey, Amy Poehler and Reese Witherspoon.

“Rather than chasing after younger and younger roles as they grow older and older, these women, and others like them, are starting their own production companies. They’re creating roles for older women, roles the men running Hollywood claim aren’t available,” Serra said.

Carbon Dating is more than the adventures of two women. The point of the show is vitality, no matter what your gender. “We want Baby Boomers, and not-quite-Baby-Boomers to embrace themselves and try new things,” Serra said. Referring to an episode in which their characters learned a skill one might not expect in a woman of a certain age, she added, “Don’t be embarrassed if you can’t pole dance. Go out and try it. It’s good exercise. Boy, did we find that out.”

See those wrinkles on our faces? They’re cracks in the walls of the youth cult.

If the thought of your grandmother pole dancing makes you head for a marijuana dispensary, that’s exactly the point. Baby Boomers can’t plan for the jobs we want years from now. We create opportunities for our generation by behaving as if time is short. These opportunites are likely to be permanent, too.

So 30, 40 or 50 years from now when your middle-aged selves find jobs, and not retirement, waiting for them, it wasn’t that we bungled Social Security. We evil Baby Boomers only wanted a way to get you out of the house.

Courtesy of Amanda Serra

Amanda Serra, who also writes under the name A.L. Trone was a staff writer and assistant editor for seven years at the now defunct literary magazine Encephalon. She is a playwright, with work produced at the Pittsburgh New Works Festival, The Cornerstone Theatre Project in West Virginia, the Acting Company in Pittsburgh and the Stages Theatre in Fullerton, California. As an actor she performed in Me and My Girl, Hello, Dolly and The Music Man. When she can tear herself away from the theater stage she works on the soundstage. Her film credits include Come Across Love, Threshold, Love Addict and the mockumentary Pittsburgh, where she worked with Jeff Goldblum, Ileana Douglas and Ed Begley, Jr. You may also have seen Amanda on television in The Outsiders, Criminal Minds, Newreaders, Outrageous 911 Calls and the Onion News Network. She plays Amelia on Carbon Dating.

Courtesy of Marcie Barkin

Marcie Barkin started her acting career by chance when she was cast in a Chevy commercial—and promptly fell in love with acting.  She was fortunate enough to work as a series regular or recurring on all the iconic television shows of the 1970s and 80s including All in the Family, Welcome Back, Kotter, the Harvey Korman Show, Fernwood Tonight, The Facts of Life and many more. Recently she has appeared in ABC’s Mixology and the independent films—Let’s Big Happy, Republic of Two, and Someone Marry Barry. She plays Madelyn on Carbon Dating.